Why I've been playing truant

[Truffle & Podge]

Ok so I can now show you all why I've been absent. This is just my introduction "im on my way" website but you can get an idea of what I've been working my butt off at. Please feel free to give honest feedback (I really haven't a clue about website design)
www.truffleandpodge.co.uk
I'm scared to death but I need to get back into work.

[vsilvered]

Welcome back Tasha and great job on realising your dream!

I wasn't sure whether you wanted a design critique or feedback on the operable site itself - so off the top of my head, here's my feedback - a mixture of critique and food for thought

* The colour scheme works well with good colour contrast between text and background

* I think although the cursive font works well as an accent font for page/section headings, but there are issues when it is used for the main body text - see this interesting article on the importance of typeface for digital products here

* Will the final design be 'responsive', i.e will it adapt to produce a good user experience on mobile and tablet devices as well as desktop?

* Products - it would be cool to see an example of how these will look on the website

[CJ57]

Hi Tasha, good to see you back and well done for getting this off the ground.
I love the text as I think it suits you and your work there is a but:/
As V said it suits the headings beautifully but I found it really difficult to concentrate on reading large paragraphs, my concentration started to wander and I wonder if I would continue on to shop if I didn't know you.
Really looking forward to seeing your work too xx

[medusa]

You are going to hate me.

The font is a real problem. It is really hard to read - I gave up after a quick scan. Also it won't be picked up by text readers (You would be surprised how many people, not just disabled people use text reading). Enlarging it to help readability doesn't help because it just gets pixilated. It's basically a very user unfriendly site.

More importantly to you as a business, google and the like won't pick up any of the text because it seems to be like a jpeg? I did this search to test:

https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&...t-us.h™l (the link looks like rubbish and might not work, but I did a search for the words "bespoke custom goldsmith" within your site's about us page).

Sorry, I'll get my coat.

[CJ57]

The text gives the essence of Tasha which would come over really well at a show or fair because it's different. People like clean and easy to read buying online and artistic flair often has to go out the window. That's one thing about the fb page, it doesn't matter how nice you want to make the text or put in paragraphs and headings it doesn't let you do very much with it.
I may have to join you Liz

[BarryM]

Sorry to be negative but I hate the font, really unpleasant to read - it needs to be much cleaner and sharper.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[susieq]

To be positive Tasha, well done for getting the website up and started. I did a very very simple one for a group I belonged to years ago and it took me weeks of work to get to the stage where I was confident to share and ask for feedback.

I like the colours you have chosen, but I'm with everyone else on the font. I do think a cursive font suits the "boutique" image, but the one you have chosen is too messy. I too gave up reading what you had to say - it went from small to large to bold to unbold and had a forward slope and then a backwards slope and back again. On my little netbook the large font size almost wrote over the text above and below which added to the chaos.

I'd like to be able to suggest an alternative, but have little recent experience. Anyone else with a website have a suitable font to suggest?

Susie

[Truffle & Podge]

I too was worried about text, I asked for feedback from quite a number of people before I published & it was mainly very positive. It definitely needs spacing properly but I can't work out how to do that.
There is a link on each page to feed keywords to Google but I haven't filled them in yet (I wanted to keep it fairly private for a few days as I tweak it) that's probably why a search brought nothing up. It also isn't optimized for anything but desktop right now.
The actual shop site will be brand new & completely user friendly (as I said this is a basic intro site which will be taken down once I'm up and running) Colours will stay the same though
The major hard work has been the business plan and working out the concept & how to pitch it. Hopefully some of this has come across. Thanks for taking the time out to look guys! I haven't been around much but hopefully you can understand why.

[medusa]

I think the colours and concept are great, but seriously the font is not user friendly, which makes the site not very user friendly. Also, Google dislikes hidden text, if that's what you mean by links to feed words to Google. Really, you need ALL the text to be actual text for SEO purposes.

After another look around, it might also help to have a central menu. When I was on the accessory page, I had to go back to the home page to get to the bespoke serves page. Also, make sure that all the images when you put them up, are labeled with short descriptions, e.g. Sterling Bridal Tiara.

I think making websites is enormously difficult and making good ones is doubly so. It took me about a year to get my site (which aesthetically is still rubbish) so it was user friendly and came up in search engines.

[vsilvered]

I too was worried about text, I asked for feedback from quite a number of people before I published & it was mainly very positive. It definitely needs spacing properly but I can't work out how to do that.
There is a link on each page to feed keywords to Google but I haven't filled them in yet (I wanted to keep it fairly private for a few days as I tweak it) that's probably why a search brought nothing up. It also isn't optimized for anything but desktop right now.
The actual shop site will be brand new & completely user friendly (as I said this is a basic intro site which will be taken down once I'm up and running) Colours will stay the same though
The major hard work has been the business plan and working out the concept & how to pitch it. Hopefully some of this has come across. Thanks for taking the time out to look guys! I haven't been around much but hopefully you can understand why.

Hi Tasha,

Once again, well done for getting this far!

With regards to web presence, user experience is really important. Even though the site you have up now is just an intro site if a user has issues with its legibility, or accessibility (i.e. users who navigate the web using assistive technologies such as screenreaders), then they may not come back when your fully functioning shop is ready, based on their experience.

As more and more people browse the internet using smaller devices, even for an intro site, getting this done would be worth the effort - it would be a good 'teaser' site prior to the main ecommerce launch, which users could share on their phones/tablets with friends.

Making the site accessible is important, especially if you think about your potential customer base, which may include users who have disabilities and use assistive technologies, like screenreaders to read and navigate the web. Here's an interesting article about web accessibility:

http://www.abilitynet.org.uk/accessi...bility-matters